


jealously, love, and blood (tastes as fine as red wine)

by CC_Writes_Stuff



Series: Make It Hurt: Whumptober 2020 [3]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, F/F, F/M, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Black Eagles Route, Held at Swordpoint, Hurt No Comfort, Jealousy, Post-Timeskip | War Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26412364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CC_Writes_Stuff/pseuds/CC_Writes_Stuff
Summary: Claude has never feared death - not with all the close calls and near-misses he’s had.Until he’a facing the point of Byleth’s sword, his life in her hands.-Written For Whumptober Day 3: My Way or the Highway
Relationships: Edelgard von Hresvelg/My Unit | Byleth, My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Reigan (One-Sided)
Series: Make It Hurt: Whumptober 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1915390
Kudos: 52
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	jealously, love, and blood (tastes as fine as red wine)

**Author's Note:**

> Taken from a Claudeleth Crimson Flower route that I never really wrote

Claude had never feared death.

Since he was a baby, Claude had faced all sorts of assassination attempts and other attempted killings. One of the servants tried to smother him with a pillow when he was just a baby. When he was six, his cousin tried to poison his food. When he was ten, his ‘friends’ pushed him into a river and left him to drown. And those were just some of the more memorable ones, not to mention the ones that faded into the back of his mind.

Even after coming to Garreg Mach Monastery, Claude still had to watch his back. Bandits attacked him just two weeks after they settled there - the only reason he didn’t die was because of the sudden appearance of Byleth and Jeralt. Between that and the rather dangerous missions the Golden Deer classroom undertook each month, followed by a five-year-long war, well, Claude was no stranger to death. Their missions were deadly, and then there were the tense few weeks after both Flayn’s capture via the Death Knight and the aftermath of whatever mysterious battle happened in the Sealed Forest, when Byleth went to avenge her father.

And then there was Edelgard’s invasion, with Byleth at the head. So, Claude was no stranger to death, even if he never quite got to his doorstep.

He had had a few close calls here and there, sure. A bandit getting too close or him getting too lax with security protocols and allowing someone to poison his food. But usually, by now, whenever he did have a close call, it was during a battle, and only a few seconds at best. Not enough time to actually ‘see’ death.

Claude had never feared death. Not until Byleth had the Sword of the Creator pressed to his throat, his life in her and Edelgard’s hands.

_“Wouldn’t it be better to let me go and have me in your debt?”_

It was a weak attempt to stay alive, knowing full well Byleth could end his life here and now and run him through. Claude could feel the warmth and the pulse of Byleth’s sword against his throat, and he wondered if Byleth could hear his heart pounding in his chest. She probably could.

Aside from the distant sound of fighting somewhere in Derdriu, the silence between him and Byleth stretched as he waited for an answer. Her face was as blank as ever, and if she was upset or happy or angry or _something_ , Claude couldn’t tell. All he could focus on was the jagged edge of the Sword of the Creator against his throat, pressed just a little too hard there. It reminded him of when he was thirteen, and assassins had snuck into the castle. They tried using him as a hostage to force his parents into either surrendering or killing themselves, handing off the crown to them instead of Claude.

The realization dawned on him, suddenly, as he recalled that memory, hitting him like a blow to the head. Almyra and Fodlan’s future, his future, his own _life_ , hung in Byleth’s hands. With one word, one flick of a wrist, Byleth could let him go to return to Almyra, or she could run him through without a second thought. And there wasn’t even a damn thing he could do about it. Hilda was dead, and Nader had already retreated. Imperial troops surrounded him on all sides - he was trapped.

Like a rabbit in a snare - nowhere to go.

If there was one thing Claude had learned to value over the years, it was control. He didn’t believe in fate or miracles by gods and goddess, but instead in playing the cards right, moving the pieces accordingly in order to win. Even though he couldn’t control everything, he had plans. Backups and Plan B’s and C’s. He’s manipulated and tricked people before in order to get information or move a piece of a plan into place. His own life was a strategy game, and if he wasn’t careful enough, wasn’t smart enough, then he’d lose - he’d die. Control was what kept Claude safe.

And now it was gone. Torn from his grasp _(and at the mercy of people that, in another universe, he may be able to call friends. But not this one)._ He couldn’t lie or cheat or trick his way out of this like he could before. His life hung in someone else’s hands.

That terrified him.

The silence probably lasted no more than five, ten seconds, fifteen at most. But to Claude, teetering on the edge of life and death, it seemed to stretch into an eternity, and all he could do was wait for Byleth’s answer, to see if he would live to see another day, or die, right here, right now.

Claude’s stepbrothers had always said a true Almyran would die in a fight. If he wasn’t frozen in place, Claude would’ve scoffed at that. Clearly, they had never been on the receiving end of a blade, knowing that whoever took them down could end their life there and then without a second thought.

When Byleth moved her sword away from his neck, Claude couldn’t help it - he snapped his eyes shut, waiting for the blow that would surely end his life. Instead, he heard the tip of the sword scraping on the cobblestone ground under him.

“Call off your troops,” Byleth said in that stoic-as-ever voice, and Claude cracked one eye open to her sword resting at her side. The once crimson-red blade was now dull ember, aside from the blood already on it. He tried not to think about the fact that it was _his_ soldiers’- the soldiers that he sent into battle, sent in to die, for his defeat - blood on her sword. He mostly failed. “We won, and Derdriu’s ours.”

“Does that mean-”

Byleth confirmed his unasked question with a single nod, before she turned to Edelgard.

A breath Claude didn’t know he had been holding in escaped his lips, utter relief crashing over him. _Alive, alive, alive._ He was alive. Sure, he was in debt to the Emperor of Adrestia and, at this rate, all of Fodlan, but he was alive. Claude’s dreams still stood, broken and unstable, but it was still there.

In the back of his mind, he heard Jameel’s voice. _“A coward you are, Khalid. Almyrans don’t surrender.” A scoff. “I suppose a bastard like you would get that from your whore of a mother.”_

“Thank you, Professor. And you, Edelgard,” Claude said, unable to keep the still-lingering shake out of his voice. “I’m truly grateful for your courageous decision. I’ll return your kindness one day… I promise." Why did he promise that? "Derdriu’s yours, now.”

Edelgard fixed him with that calculating gaze of hers, before turning to the Imperial soldiers that flooded the city. She rose Amyr up into the air, the Relic glowing with its unnatural orange power.

“Everyone! Raise your voices in a victory cheer! Derdriu is ours!”

Shouts and cheers came from the red-clad Imperial Soldiers, deafening to Claude’s ears. Lances, bows, axes, fists, and swords were raised into the air in celebration, and Claude tried not to be too crestfallen about it. He always knew it would come to one of two ends - his defeat, or Edelgard and Byleth’s defeat. Still, the taste was bitter in his mouth, shame welling up in his gut. Bastard child or no, he had failed his city, his soldiers. His tactics just didn’t seem to work when it came to Edelgard, to _Byleth_.

Claude watched as Byleth sheathed her sword, but she still kept one eye trained on him, probably expecting him to do something. If Failnaught was within reach and he was an idiot, he might. But he knew that if he tried to make a break for Failnaught, Byleth wouldn’t be as forgiving the second time around.

The bitterness in his mouth grew stronger.

 _Foolish,_ his inner voice chided. _Foolish of you to drop your guard, Khalid. Foolish of you to trust someone. Foolish of you to think she might be anything more than a tool._

It was the same voice he heard five years ago, had been hearing since Byleth first left the Monastery on Edelgard’s heel.

“You can stop looking at me like that, Teach,” Claude said to Byleth, his old nickname for her falling off his tongue like honey. “Derdriu has fallen, and the Alliance has collapsed. There’s nothing I can do to turn things around at this point.” Not unless he wants to run a suicide mission.

“Says the famed Master Tactician,” Byleth replied evenly, reaching into a pouch at her waist and pulling out a vulenary. Despite himself, Claude let out a sigh. His heart is hammering in his chest, and he can’t tell from what.

“Are you going to let me go?” He asks her, before pinning his gaze on Edelgard as she walked over. Resisting the urge to snort. Even after five years, Edelgard is as short as ever, not like he grew anymore than he alreadydid. “The Alliance has already fallen, so I’m no use as a prisoner of war. I’m better off leaving.” The only thing he would be good at was a hostage for if they wanted Dimitri to stand down without having to kill him.

Byleth’s eyes shifted over to Failnaught, then back to him, before she uncorked the vulenary.

“Lend us your strength,” she asked, blinking. Claude felt his eyes widen. And for the briefest moment, he considered joining, joining Teach, instead of going back to Almyra, disgraced.

But he saw the way Byleth looked at Edelgard, and something coiled in his gut, something dangerously close to the envy he felt watching his stepbrothers play games without him.

“Lend you my…” He started, before huffing out a laugh as he got up, careful to not provoke Edelgard. Claude shot a wink at Byleth as she drank the vulenary. “I knew I liked you, Teach. But I daresay Fodlan would be a lot more peaceful with me around. Right, Your Majesty?”

“It’s as you say, Claude,” Edelgard agreed with a nod, still looking at him with that eagle-eyed gaze of hers, lavender eyes cold. It was the same look his mother got whenever there was a new assassination attempt on him and the perpetrator was brought to justice. Chills ran up his spine. “So long as you remain here, the faction of the Alliance that is against the Empire will continue to support you.”

“Too true,” Claude said, looking between the two fighters. They were standing side-by-side, like a king and queen on a chessboard. And he was on the other side, alone - just like always.

“It’s best if I just leave Fodlan altogether. I’ll just have to find some other way to pay back my debt to you. All I ask is that you go easy on the Alliance. After all, no one would dare defy you now. And, please, treat my former classmates well. I’ve asked them to cooperate with you if I lost.”

Edelgard blinked as Byleth looked between the two, then back to Derdriu. “Wait… did your scheming include a plan for if the Alliance lost?”

Claude shrugged, shaking his head. “It just seems that way right now. You think way too highly of me, Your Majesty, Teach,” He explained. “Outside of Derdriu, most of the Alliance is unscathed. Not to mention, ready to join your army and superior strength.”

The words were bitter on his tongue. He never thought he’d have to say those words to anyone, family or not. Oh, if only his stepbrothers could see him now. He’d be the laughing stock of the palace.

 _You will be, once you return,_ another part of him says. _Some prince you are, Khalid._

Then he sighed and shook his head. “In all honesty, I was hoping to become a supreme ruler and lead Fodlan to peace myself. But… I guess that won’t be happening now.”

“Claude-” Byleth started, but he cut her off. He didn’t want pity, and he didn’t want any more false promises and white lies.

“Good luck to you two,” he said, gaze lingering on Byleth’s face as he shot her a wink. She looked… just slightly surprised, though it was hard to tell, but her face pinked just a little bit, and Claude’s heart flipped. He ignored it, turning and grabbing Failnaught, and headed back to his wyvern, still surprisingly unscathed by the battle, courtesy of Byleth essentially knocking him off her back while Ferdinand had come in to keep her occupied while she fought him.

A part of Claude wanted to stay. Wanted, naively, to see if he could try again, reset the board and make new moves. But he had been given the chance to escape, to leave and go back to Almyra unscathed, other than the bitter taste of defeat _(of longing, of regret, of anger at himself)_ in his mouth.

Better than blood, he supposed. After all, defeat didn’t necessarily mean death. It means that he would live to see another day, to see his mom and dad and younger sister once more, to stay alive. He could come back from defeat and try again if he was foolish enough too, and besides, the taste of defeat always went away.

But death? Death was final, permanent. There was no coming back from that.

Claude had never been terrified of death, not until he had a sword pressed to his neck, not until he escaped it by the skin of his teeth. But now he realized just how lucky he had been to survive this long, to have Byleth spare his life.

But seeing her look at Edelgard, Claude can’t tell if it was kindness or cruelty.

**Author's Note:**

> [I Have a Tumblr!](https://ccwritesstuff.tumblr.com/)


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